The Day of the Scorpion (36 page)

‘I beg your pardon,’ he said – and she shut her eyes, to listen only to the voice – ‘it was a slip. I seldom have the opportunity of speaking English to anyone except myself.’

A pause.

‘I understand,’ another voice said above her head. She kept her eyes shut. The voices were those of two Englishmen talking. ‘These proceedings,’ the second of the two voices went on, ‘are authorized by an order of the Governor in Council dated the fifteenth of May, nineteen hundred and forty-four and the purpose of the proceedings is to examine any facts relevant in your case to the detention order under the Defence of India Rule. You may if you wish decline to submit to the examination, in which case the proceedings will be terminated immediately. I am also instructed to advise you that the purpose of the proceedings is to examine and not to make a recommendation in regard to your detention. You should not assume that refusal or acceptance of the examination or the examination itself will have any bearing on the order for your detention or upon its eventual termination. On that understanding I now ask you whether you decline or submit to the examination.’

A pause.

‘I submit to the examination on that undertaking.’

‘Your submission is recorded. In the case of Kumar, Hari, son of the late Duleep Kumar, at present lodged in the Kandipat jail, Kandipat, Ranpur, under warrant dated August twenty-four, nineteen hundred and forty-two, Rule 26,
Defence of India Rules, and in accordance with order dated fifteen May nineteen forty-four, of the Governor in Council, Government House, Ranpur, Captain Nigel Robert Alexander Rowan and Mr Vallabhai Ramaswamy Gopal examining. Examinee not under oath. Transcript of proceedings for submission on confidential file to His Excellency the Governor, copy on the confidential file to the Member for Home and Law, Executive Council.’

Again a pause. She opened her eyes. Kumar still sat with his shoulders hunched. He had returned to his contemplation of the table, as if in deference to a formal rigmarole that was no particular concern of his, but as the silence lengthened, was filled by nothing more enlivening to the ears than the sound of Captain Rowan adjusting and checking the papers in front of him, Kumar glanced up again to stare at his chief examiner and again she was struck by the alertness his eyes – and the clarity of his voice – were evidence of. She could not interpret it beyond that. Impossible to say whether he sensed danger or saw the examination as a source of hope. It could be either. It could be both. But whichever it was the alertness and the clarity betrayed the presence of the man inside the hunched submissive figure of the prisoner.

‘Since a detention order under the Defence of India Rules is made without recourse to trial in the criminal courts,’ Captain Rowan began, ‘the documentary evidence in front of this examining board consists of summaries of evidence, statements and submissions by the civil authorities of the district in which you resided. In this instance, which involved five other men as well as yourself, the documents were submitted to the office of the Divisional Commissioner before the order for detention was made on you and these five other men. We are however only concerned with these documents as they relate to you. It is not within the terms of reference of this board to disclose the details of these documents to you, but it is upon them that we shall base our questions. I shall begin by reading to you a list of names. The question I ask in each case is – were you at the time of your detention personally acquainted with the man whose name I read out. I invite you to answer yes or no as the case may be,
after each name. With the name I shall give a brief description – for example occupation – to reduce the risk of confusion. Is that understood?’

‘Yes.’

‘The first name is S. V. Vidyasagar, sub-editor employed on the
Mayapore Hindu
, originally employed as a reporter on the
Mayapore Gazette
. Were you acquainted with this man?’

‘Yes.’

‘Narayan Lal, employed as a clerk in the Mayapore Book Depot.’

‘Yes.’

‘Nirmal Bannerjee, unemployed, graduate in electrical engineering of the Mayapore Technical College, son of B. N. Bannerjee, a clerk in the offices of Dewas Chand Lal, Contractor.’

‘Yes.’

‘Bapu Ram, trainee at the British-Indian Electrical Company’s factory, Mayapore.’

‘Yes.’

‘Moti Lal, last employed as a clerk at the warehouse of Romesh Chand Gupta Sen, contractor of Mayapore, sentenced to six months imprisonment in 1941 under section 188 of the Penal Code. Escaped from custody during February 1942, and according to this document not apprehended at the date of the document’s origin.’

‘Yes.’

‘Puranmal Mehta, stenographer employed in the office of the Imperial Bank of India, Mayapore.’

‘Yes.’

‘Gopi Lal, unemployed, son of one Shankar Lal described as a hotel-keeper.’

‘Yes.’

‘Pandit B. N. V. Baba, of B-1, Chillianwallah Bazaar road, Mayapore, described as a teacher.’

‘Yes.’

‘I shall now divide those names into two groups. In the first we have two names – S. V. Vidyasagar and Pandit Baba. The questions I shall ask relate to the kind of acquaintanceship you had with these men. In the case of Pandit Baba the records at my disposal, those on your case file, give me no
idea why at the time of your arrest you were asked what you knew of him. Perhaps that would be clear after a study of the case files of the other men arrested at the same time as yourself, but those case files are not available to this examining board because they aren’t pertinent to this examination. I would stress the latter point to you. This board examines you wholly on the basis of the file pertaining to your own arrest and subsequent detention. In other words, you are examined by a board unprejudiced by anything that is recorded in the cases of the other men arrested. My first question, with regard to Pandit Baba, is therefore this: Would you tell the board why – in your opinion – you were asked what your relationship with him was? I would remind you that your reply to this question as recorded in the file was to the effect that you had nothing to say. In fact ninety-nine per cent of your recorded replies to questions were to that same effect. I hope the same situation isn’t going to arise this morning. Will you then answer the question? Why should you have been asked if you knew this Pandit Baba? Have you any idea?’

There was an appreciable pause but when Kumar spoke any initial hesitancy he might have felt to answer questions was quite absent from the tone of voice.

‘I believe he was thought to have a lot of influence over young Indians of the educated class.’

‘Who thought this?’

‘The civil authorities in Mayapore.’

‘Including the police?’

‘Yes. The police once had him in for questioning because one of his disciples got into trouble.’

‘Disciples?’

‘Young men who gathered round him to listen to him talk.’

‘What sort of trouble had this particular follower got into?’

‘I believe he’d published or distributed a political pamphlet, or made a speech. I forget which.’

‘Were you one of Pandit Baba’s followers?’

‘No.’

‘Did you know the man who got into trouble?’

‘No.’

‘Then who told you about this affair?’

‘I heard it as a matter of course. I was employed on the
Mayapore Gazette
. In a newspaper office you hear quite a lot that never becomes common knowledge.’

‘What happened to the man who published this pamphlet or made this speech?’

‘He was sent to prison.’

‘What was his name?’

‘I forget.’

‘What happened to the Pandit?’

‘Nothing.’

‘How well did you know Pandit Baba?’

‘I knew him as a man my aunt hired to try to teach me an Indian language.’ A pause. ‘He smelt strongly of garlic.’ A pause. ‘He was very unpunctual.’ A pause. ‘The lessons weren’t a success.’

‘When was this?’

‘In 1938.’

‘He tried to teach you Hindustani?’

‘Yes.’

‘Until then you knew no Indian language at all?’

‘None.’

A rustle of paper. Then Gopal’s voice: ‘I have several points in regard to the detenu’s early background and I should like to raise them at this juncture.’

Rowan nodded. Gopal addressed Kumar direct:

‘Your father took you to England when you were aged two, according to this document. You were born in the United Provinces. Your father was a landowner there. Have you an inheritance in the United Provinces?’

‘No. My father sold his interest to his brothers before leaving for England.’

‘Your father never taught you your native tongue?’

A pause.

‘He was at pains to try to teach me nothing.’

‘Why?’

‘He wanted me brought up in an entirely English environment so far as that was possible. I had a governess, then a tutor. Then I went to a private school and on to Chillingborough. I didn’t see much of him.’

‘Why was he wanting this – did he tell you?’

‘He wanted me to enter the Indian Civil Service, as an Indian, but with all the advantages of an Englishman.’

‘What were those advantages, was he saying?’

‘I think he thought of them as advantages of character, manner and attitude. And language.’

‘Because he thought the English character, manner, attitude and language were superior to the Indian?’

‘No. More viable in relation to the operation of the administration.’

‘I am not fully understanding that reply.’

‘It is an English administration, based on English ideas of government. He thought an Indian at a disadvantage unless he had been trained to identify himself completely with these ideas. He admired the administration as such. He thought it would be best continued by fully Anglicized Indians.’

‘Did you share his ambition for you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘I knew no other.’

‘You wished to enter the Indian Civil Service and serve the administration ?’

‘Wish is the wrong word. It suggests the existence of an alternative choice and a preference for one of them. In my case I was never aware of an alternative.’

‘From this document,’ Gopal went on, ‘I see that your mother died soon after you were born. Did the loss of your mother contribute to your father’s decision to leave India and establish himself as a businessman in England?’

‘It made it easier for him to put his plan into practice.’

‘It was some two years after your mother’s death that he took you to England. Presumably it took a little time for him to make the necessary arrangements?’

‘He had to wait until his own mother died.’

‘She was ill?’

‘No. He had promised his father to look after her.’

‘Your grandfather was dead?’

‘He’d left home.’ A pause. ‘He renounced his worldly goods and left home wearing a loin-cloth and carrying a begging bowl. He intended to become what is called
sannyasi
.’ A
pause. ‘The family never saw him again, but my father kept his promise and stayed until his mother died.’

‘I see. Had he always hoped to leave India and go to England?’

‘If he had a son.’

‘He had been in England before?’

‘He studied law there before the First World War but failed the examinations. He had a business sense but no academic sense.’

‘He was what we are calling Anglophile? He admired the English way of life?’

‘He thought an intimate understanding of and a familiarity with it essential for anyone serving the administration.’

‘What were his political views in regard to India?’

‘We never discussed politics as such.’

‘Was he in favour of constitutional development leading eventually to a form of independence or of more hasty means to that end?’

‘The former I imagine. He said India would remain under British rule well beyond his lifetime and probably far into mine.’

‘Would you then say that he was anxious that you should become the kind of Indian whom the British would be happy to see as one of their administrative successors?’

‘Yes. In later years he talked much along those lines, whenever I saw him.’

‘Was that also your ambition? To become that kind of Indian?’

‘I had no recollection of India whatsoever. I didn’t know what different kinds of Indian there might be. My upbringing was entirely English. There was probably little difference in my attitude to the prospect of coming to India when I was older and the attitude of the average English boy whose family intended he should have a career out here.’

‘You had, then, no sense of coming home when eventually you came to India?’

‘The sense I had was the exact opposite.’

‘Were you perturbed by what you found?’

‘Yes.’

‘Perturbed by the condition of the people?’

‘I was perturbed by my own condition.’

‘You did not look around you and think – these are my people, this is my country, I must work to free them of the foreign yoke that weighs them down?’

‘I wanted nothing more than to go home.’

‘Home – to England?’

‘Yes.’

‘But later, perhaps, you were ashamed of this selfish attitude and began to listen to young men of your own age and kind, to be affected somewhat by their hot-headed but understandable talk and ambitions?’

‘They might have been of my age. They weren’t of my kind. I was a unique specimen.’

‘Unique? Just because you had been brought up in England?’

‘No. Because I came back to a family my father had cut himself off from – a middle-class, orthodox Hindu family.’ A pause. ‘My uncle-by-marriage tried to make me undergo a ritual purification to get rid of the stain of living abroad. The ritual included drinking cow-urine. It was a family that didn’t believe in education, let alone Western-style education. Not a single member of the Kumar family or of the Gupta Sen family my aunt married into had ever entered the administration. They were middle-class Hindus of the merchant and petty landowning class. Against this background – yes, I was unique.’

Gopal said, ‘Thank you, Mr Kumar. I have no further questions on this subject.’

Rowan nodded, glanced at his open file, then looked up at Kumar who slowly transferred his attention from Gopal For a while the two men – whose voices sounded so alike – stared at each other.